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This article builds on methodological literature addressing ways in which qualitative research interviewing can utilise principles derived from psychoanalysis and psychoanalytic psychotherapy, focussing on the sharing of interpretations and formulations with research participants. We review the accounts of different researchers who have considered the sharing of formulations and more formalised quasi-dynamic interpretative comments in this type of psychoanalytically informed interview research. Via this review and considering our experience as practitioner researchers, we suggest that careful reflection is required. The notion of interpretative work in psychoanalytic psychotherapy is potentially easily misapprehended because the term interpretation can refer to a range of (at times, very different) practices. Moreover, the terms of reference for dialogue in research and psychotherapy are fundamentally different for those engaged in them; an interpretation or feedback will not likely be received in the same fashion in a research interview as it would be in a psychotherapy session. Therefore, would-be research participants should be informed about the type of interview being used, with questions asked about their expectations. Furthermore, they should be encouraged to speak about what they may anticipate will be related to them of findings/analyses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mental health vulnerability of children and young people in foster and adoptive families is well recognised, which has led to the development of dedicated posts and care pathways in mental health care provision. This article reports on learning resulting from local quality improvement work in a single child and adolescent mental health service team. This work was concerned with the 'front door' of access to care for these groups and specifically addresses initial consultations with adoptive parents and adoption professionals, reporting findings from an analysis of reports from consultations undertaken over a 13-month period between April 2021 and May 2022. The analysis highlights that support can be sought by these parents and professionals for diverse issues relating to mental health which is also indicative of a high level of need amongst children and young people involved with specialist mental health provision. The analysis also has wider implications for practice in demonstrating the benefits of attending to clinical data to contribute meaningfully to practice-based scholarship in this type of specialist setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why you should read this article: • To enhance your understanding of young people's use of digital technology • To learn how digital technology can be used to provide mental health services for young people • To recognise the importance of considering young people's abilities and preferences when implementing digital interventions Background: Digital technology affords opportunities to expand mental healthcare beyond the clinic setting, supporting sustainable delivery. A pilot qualitative study was undertaken with a view to using the experience gained from it to develop a substantive project in this area. Aim: To identify and better understand the perceived barriers and benefits to using digital technologies when delivering mental healthcare to young people. Method: In-depth semi-structured interviews were conducted with three young people under the care of a child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team. The interview data were analysed thematically. Findings: Three main themes were identified from the interviews: digital identity and digital literacy; trusting and accessing digital health resources; and therapeutic relationships, choice and convenience. Conclusion: The findings of this pilot study reinforce the importance of avoiding a 'one-size-fits-all' approach to integrating digital technology in CAMHS. It was also identified that it is important to carefully consider the involvement of parents when conducting mental health research with children and young people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a recent contribution to this journal, Cummings (2023) reports findings from a preliminary qualitative study of practitioner viewpoints regarding digitally delivered mental health support to care-experienced young people. Cummings' study highlights the need to engage with professional experiences of using digital methods with this group, both during and outside of the COVID-19 pandemic. A response to - and commentary on – Cummings' contribution is provided, to advance discussion of issues identified by the research. We reflect on our experience as practitioners and researchers working in and alongside specialist child and adolescent mental health service teams serving care-experienced children and young people. We focus on workspaces in remote working, therapeutic technique in online and telephone-based care, and virtues and challenges of remote care delivery. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why you should read this article: • To identify the benefits that group-based psychoeducation intervention may bring to inpatient care settings for older people with mental health issues • To better understand how group-based interventions are experienced by older people with mental health issues • To reflect on some of the challenges involved in introducing group-based interventions in inpatient care settings This article reports on a service evaluation of a group-based psychoeducation programme for older people in an inpatient mental healthcare setting. It sought to explore how the programme was experienced by patients and staff, as well as its acceptability and the feasibility for implementation in the longer term. Via questionnaires, views were gathered from patients and staff. A focus group interview with staff facilitating the group sessions was also undertaken, and patient attendance records for sessions were collected and compared with demographic data relating to the two wards housed in the unit where the programme took place. The programme was generally viewed as a positive addition to care delivery by staff and patient respondents in offering an adjunct to pharmacological treatment, increasing familiarity with psychology staff, encouraging patients to develop a greater degree of mastery regarding their health and fostering mutual support among the patient community. The role of the ward environment in supporting access to group-based intervention is also considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clinical High Risk for Psychosis has evolved in recent years as a conceptual and clinical entity, representing a shift in focus from the syndromal psychosis state to a recognition of the pre-psychotic state as a period of potential preventive intervention. Much existing evidence has been generated from well-resourced countries, with a more limited body of literature available from Africa and other Majority World countries. Against a backdrop of prevailing systemic challenges, it is necessary to appraise the state of knowledge on Clinical High Risk for Psychosis in Africa. In this perspective article, we cover epidemiology, risk factors, predictors of psychosis conversion, as well as an overview of sociocultural factors, notably stigma, and the barriers to mental health services in African settings. We discuss existing and promising assessment approaches and reflect on preventive and early intervention strategies. We conclude with recommendations including the need for more clinical, longitudinal, and collaborative research anchored in an integrative transdisciplinary approach. We highlight the need for more culturally valid assessment tools and strategies to improve access to and utilization of services while also reducing stigma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Why you should read this article: • To enhance your knowledge of professional self-disclosure • To understand how mental health nurses can appropriately use professional self-disclosure in their work with foster carers • To learn about how approaches to self-disclosure changed during the shift to remote working during the COVID-19 pandemic Professional self-disclosure can be defined as a clinician revealing personal information about themselves to the person they are caring for. This article provides reflections from clinicians working in child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) and their navigation of professional self-disclosure during the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic. The reflections focus on the use of self-disclosure in supportive relationships with foster carers. Drawing on the authors' practice experiences as clinicians in specialist CAMHS settings, the article considers changes in the way that self-disclosure was approached following the shift to remote care delivery during the pandemic. The authors suggest that remote working involves a potentially increased scope for inappropriate use of self-disclosure and outline the implications for mental health nurses working with foster carers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on mental health service research, trauma-informed care (TIC), and the use of freedom of information (FoI) requests for data collection. Topics include the limited availability of TIC training for NHS professionals, the role of FoI requests in gathering data, and criticisms of TIC implementation including concerns about TIC potentially obscuring broader social issues related to trauma.

The article describes a designated adoption lead role based in a specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team serving adopted children who are considered particularly vulnerable to experiencing mental health issues. Topics discussed include core aspects of the role of a specialist practitioner lead for adoption in a CAMHS team and methods of delivering advice, training, education and support to adoptive parents and adoption professionals.

Freedom of information (FoI) legislation has been represented as a valuable but underused means of generating otherwise unavailable data from public authorities in health and social care research. This article complements extant literature on the use of FoI requests for research intended to inform health and social care policy and improve the quality of practice. Reflections are provided on challenges and ethical considerations, drawing on relevant literature and the authors' experience undertaking studies addressing different topics in mental health and child welfare using FoI requests as the primary means of data collection. The recommendations are practically orientated. They are aimed primarily at social work and mental health researchers who may have limited knowledge of how FoI requests might be used in their work but be curious about the application of this approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article stages a discussion on the role of social psychiatry in present-day child and adolescent mental health care. Taking a broad perspective, it considers the growing demand for mental health services for children and young people and how social psychiatry can be situated in the current framework of psychiatry as a medical specialty as well as within child and adolescent mental health care provision more widely. Avenues available to expand social psychiatry's reach and impact in the field of child and adolescent mental health are also addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) provision serving children living in local authority care (i.e. who are looked-after) and other vulnerable groups, consultation with social care professionals and carers is an important part of care delivery. It functions as both a pathway to direct assessment and treatment and an indirect intervention, via formulation, advice and support to the network surrounding a child. This article is concerned with consultation practice in a single multidisciplinary CAMHS team and incorporates two elements. First, it reports on an audit of basic data collected over a 26-month period for quality improvement purposes, and second, it provides practice-based reflections on facilitating consultations during the COVID-19 pandemic. The audit findings, notably that looked-after, adopted, and 13–15 year old children were most likely to be referred on for direct assessment, are discussed and contextualised in a description of local arrangements and working practices, as well as relevant research literature. The reflections involve consideration of changes in problems for which consultations were sought during the initial stages of the pandemic and challenges created by the turn to remote care delivery. In addressing these two tasks, an illustrative example is provided of the role that service audits and practice-based reflection on consultation work can play in helping to identify inequities in access to care in specialist CAMHS teams. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article describes an innovative initiative based on principles of traumainformed care which involves clinicians from a specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team providing input to youth justice services. At a local level, the project seeks to help address recognised gaps in service provision whereby children and young people involved with the criminal justice system are afforded inconsistent access to care and treatment yet recognised as being at increased risk for having experienced early adversity and suffering mental health difficulties. The article takes stock of the project's development via reference to three interlinked strands of work it incorporates: work supporting staff; direct work with children and young people; and training workshops for professionals. Reference is also made to the findings of an evaluation of the project. In so doing, the article adds further support to arguments for a senior clinician role in CAMHS provision linked to youth justice services, and the necessity of staff training to embed this role and support the recognition of trauma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The topic of professional self-disclosure has been subject to uneven levels of attention in the social work literature. Although many writers and researchers have addressed the topic in the context of clinical social work, there has been limited dedicated attention to its use and role in routine practice in child protection and child welfare settings. This article is concerned with a specific type of self-disclosure: what social workers say to the parents they work with about whether they themselves are parents or not. Drawing on interview material from a research study concerned with how children's services professionals experience the suffering of parents, it explores the psycho-social dynamics of social workers investing in different positions about making or refusing to make disclosures about their parental status. This allows for differentiated insight into the contexts that surround parental status disclosure and highlights how decision making around whether and what to disclose can be led more by anxieties and concerns about the maintenance of a particular professional identity than deliberation about potential benefits to parents and the working relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article adds to literature addressing research beneficence from a psychoanalytic perspective, providing reflections focussing on notions of containment and container-contained dynamics as derived from the Kleinian/post-Kleinian tradition of psychoanalysis. It does so by reference to the accounts of participants in a study which explored how professionals working in local authority children's services in England experience the suffering of parents. In this research, a psychoanalytically informed interview approach was used, and space was provided for participants to reflect on the experience of participation. The variable representation of this experience is considered along with the experience of the researcher carrying out the interviews. Questions are raised about using the language of containment in the context of this research approach and whether this may say more about a researcher's desire to be helpful to participants and less about participants' actual experiences (and a genuinely psychoanalytically based understanding of them). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

British psycho-social studies is a new paradigm of transdisciplinary scholarship situated at the borderlands of social and psychological theory. Its development has been represented as providing avenues for a more critical and reflexive engagement with psychoanalysis in social work, disentangled from the unfavourable meanings with which psychoanalysis has been associated (e.g. as apolitical and reductively focussed on intrapsychic dynamics). However, much remains to be said about the implications of methodological developments and debate in psycho-social studies for social work research, particularly in terms of the impetus it provides for reflecting on the transformations brought about in resituating psychoanalytic concepts and practices away from their traditional clinical context in social research and theory. This article draws from doctoral research concerned specifically with the theory and practice of research interviewing. It provides an account of the development of this research and explores the role of interpretation as part of a psychoanalytically-informed interview approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hollway and Jefferson's free association narrative interview method is an approach to qualitative research interviewing that draws on concepts and practices traditionally associated with psychoanalytic therapy. Owing to this psychosocial framework, the method is an attractive proposition for psychodynamically orientated practitioner-researchers. Various studies by researchers in counselling and clinical psychology and the allied fields of social work and mental health nursing have made use of the method or aspects of it. This article describes and provides reflections on the completion of one study informed by the method involving interviews with social workers and intensive family intervention professionals working in English local authority children's services. The article is concerned with some of the more practical issues involved in doing this research: gaining access to and interviewing a suitable sample of professionals; the format of interviews and interviewing technique; the analysis of interview material; and the role of researcher reflexivity and the use of the researcher's 'countertransference' experience (with a specific concern for countertransference boredom). Overall, the article contributes to furthering thinking about the free association narrative interview method as a tool of social work research and what it means to do qualitative research with social work and child welfare professionals in a psychoanalytically informed way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work change programmes rooted in a particular practice theory and design are increasingly a fixture of UK local authority social work and the focus of a small but developing body of research. However, in this research to date, there has been a lack of engagement with the perspectives of families. In this article, we detail findings from 23 family interviews undertaken as part of an independent evaluation of a social work change programme in a single local authority. These findings afford insight into the positive influence change programmes can have on engaging families and re-routing practitioners to work in a relationship-based way. They also illustrate the limitations for reshaping practice in the context of rising levels of need, a paucity of supportive provision, and administrative burdens remaining the same as before the introduction of a change programme. As part of the article, we offer some brief reflections on the recruitment of families for evaluative study to assist other researchers and local authority professionals who may be involved in comparable evaluations in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the development of a digital ‘toolkit’ for adoptive parents in the children’s social care service of a single local authority is described. A work in progress, the toolkit is to be accessed by parents online and involves a series of videos around parenting topics and the post-adoption therapeutic work undertaken in the service, as well as links to other parenting information and resources. The article combines accounts of the toolkit’s development in the authority and a piece of ‘practice research’ being carried out that makes use of a DVD version. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social work has a vital role to play in supporting Autistic people of all ages. Whether in facilitating access to other services, such as housing, enhancing quality of life, or in a safeguarding capacity, social workers have a legal and moral responsibility to ensure their practice ensures full, equitable involvement of Autistic people. Regrettably, research evidence indicates practice is not always inclusive and can fall short in responding effectively to Autistic people’s needs. This article adds to recent UK practice guidance and social work scholarship concerning social work and autism. It does so by introducing a framework developed by Autistic doctors for meeting Autistic people’s needs in medical settings known as ‘Autistic SPACE’ and exploring how it could be used for social work contexts. The five core autistic needs recognised in the SPACE framework are addressed, i.e. Sensory, Predictability, Acceptance, Communication and Empathy. How a practice-near social work perspective may aid in developing the framework further is also considered, extending the acronym from SPACE to SPACES to highlight the significance of Social Safety and Support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Children and young people in foster and adoptive families are considered more vulnerable to a high level of mental health need when compared to peers who are not care-experienced or adopted. Acceptance of this view amongst clinical providers and policy makers has necessitated the development of specialist provision and dedicated care pathways within child and adolescent mental health services. In this provision, practitioner-initiated quality improvement projects help in appraising the effectiveness of clinical interventions in local contexts, as well as identifying areas for service learning and practice reflection. This article reports on the evaluation of a mentalisation-based psychoeducation group intervention for adoptive parents and foster carers. The evaluation activity took place in a single child and adolescent mental health service setting, starting during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the intervention being implemented online via videoconferencing. In the article, after introducing the intervention (based on the Family Minds model), an analysis of clinical data collected pre- and post-intervention is reported. Few results of the analysis regarding the two pre- and post-measures reached statistical significance, indicating only changes in the magnitude of stress in the parent/carer-child system. A series of reflections are posed that consider what this finding means in developing fit-for-purpose support for adoptive parents and foster carers in child and adolescent mental health service contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the book "I'll Never Give Up on You," by Becky Hope.

Background: This article focuses on approaches to qualitative research interviewing that draw direct inspiration from psychoanalytic therapy. The reflective discussion piece provides a critical spotlight on this method to promote reflection and ethical application., Aim: To provide clarity regarding the meaning of psychoanalytically informed, psycho-social research and the interpretive nature of qualitative interviews and of therapy, and to reflect on nurse researchers' partiality for using quasi-dynamic interpretative comments and the sharing of formulations in interviews., Discussion: The authors review relevant literature, and comment on the apprehension and uncertainty researchers may experience with this type of research approach., Conclusion: Researchers should consider how they conduct themselves as interviewers and what to share of the analysis of participants' accounts based on the specifics of the research, including their or their team's experience of conducting psychotherapy and their and participants' expectations about what may be therapeutic about interviews., Implications for Practice: Psychoanalytically informed research interviewing should be used in a reflective way by nurse researchers with attention paid to the limitations and possibilities of parallels between psychotherapeutic and research interview dialogue., Competing Interests: None declared, (© 2022 RCN Publishing Company Ltd. All rights reserved. Not to be copied, transmitted or recorded in any way, in whole or part, without prior permission of the publishers.)

Background: Approaching qualitative interviews using principles drawn from psychoanalytic therapy can assist nurse researchers in developing nuanced accounts of participants' and their own subjectivity. Yet, doing so means confronting questions about the use of psychoanalytic concepts and techniques outside the traditional clinical context of the consulting room., Aim: To consider the researcher's interpretive involvement when a psychoanalytically informed interview approach is used with specific reference to email correspondence as a form of interpretive intervention., Discussion: The authors describe the experience of completing a study involving a psychoanalytically informed interview approach. The interpretive quality of email correspondence is illustrated via reference to the case of one study participant for whom this correspondence appeared to help in the level of insight afforded overall., Conclusion: When using a psychoanalytically informed interview approach, researchers should consider emails delineating topics for discussion in follow-up interviews as a form of interpretive intervention., Implications for Practice: Nurse researchers interested in this type of method should reflect on the interpretive function of email correspondence. Pre-participation and pre-interview dialogue with participants may be used to explore participants' views on the potentially therapeutic aspects of participation and what might be related to them of the researcher's understanding., Competing Interests: None declared, (© 2022 RCN Publishing Company Ltd. All rights reserved. Not to be copied, transmitted or recorded in any way, in whole or part, without prior permission of the publishers.)